In a silver halide color photographic light-sensitive material, a multilayer light-sensitive layer composed of three kinds of silver halide emulsion layers selectively sensitized to blue light, green light and red light is coated on a support. For example, in a so-called color photographic paper, a red-sensitive emulsion layer, a green-sensitive emulsion layer and a blue-sensitive emulsion layer are usually coated on the support in this order from the exposure side, and a color mixing preventing or ultraviolet light absorbing interlayer, a protective layer, etc., are provided among the light-photosensitive layers.
In a color positive film, a green-sensitive emulsion layer, a red-sensitive emulsion layer and a blue-sensitive emulsion layer are coated in this order on a support generally from a side far from the support, i.e., from the exposure side. A color negative film has a variety of layer arrangements, but generally, a blue-sensitive emulsion layer, a green-sensitive emulsion layer and a red-sensitive emulsion layer are coated in this order from the exposure side. Some photographic materials having at least two emulsion layers having the same color sensitivity but different sensitivities include an emulsion layer of a different color sensitivity arranged between the first-mentioned emulsion layers with further inclusion of a bleachable yellow filter layer, an interlayer, a protective layer, etc.
To form a color photographic image, photographic couplers of three colors, yellow, magenta and cyan are included in light-sensitive layers of a photographic material, and the exposed photographic material is subjected to color development with so-called color developing agents. A coupling reaction of the oxidation product of an aromatic primary amine with the couplers gives colored dyes. The couplers desirably have the highest possible coupling speeds at this time to give high color densities within a limited time period of development. The colored dyes are required to be brilliant cyan, magenta and yellow dyes of little subsidiary absorptions and to give a color photographic image of good color reproducibility.
The color photographic image formed, on the other hand, is required to have good preservability under various conditions. To meet this requirement, it is important that the speeds of fading or discoloration of the colored dyes of different hues should be slow, and that the speed of fading should be as uniform as possible over the entire range of image densities to avoid changes in the color balance of the remaining dye image.
With conventional photographic materials, particularly conventional color papers, cyan dye images are greatly degraded by fading in the dark under the influences of humidity and heat upon long term storage, and their color balance tends to be varied. Hence, a strong desire exists to improve the cyan dye images in this respect. The conventional photographic materials have a strong contradictory tendency. For example, a cyan dye image resistant to fading in the dark has a poor hue and is susceptible to fading or vanishing under light. Accordingly, a novel combination of couplers has been desired.
In an attempt to solve the foregoing problem partly, certain combinations of couplers have heretofore been proposed, and examples thereof are described, for example, in Japanese Patent Publication No. 7344/77, and Japanese Patent Application (OPI) Nos. 200037/82, 57238/84 and 160143/84 (the term "OPI" as used herein refers to a "published unexamined Japanese patent application open to public inspection"). These combinations, however, have not been able to entirely remove various defects such as insufficient color formability, poor hues of formed dyes, adverse effects on color reproduction, variations in the color balance of residual dye images owing to degradation by light or heat, or temporary disappearance of cyan under light. The phenomenon of temporary disappearance of cyan is reversibly corrected in the dark to regain the original color, but an improvement is also desired in this regard.